Beloved ‘Big Guy’ Jump held riotous ‘WKRP’ cast together

Gordon Jump, the veteran television actor who died Monday in Los Angeles at 71, will live forever. Because it was from Jump’s lips, as he played WKRP boss Arthur “Big Guy” Carlson, that came the funniest line in television history.

“As God as my witness, I thought turkeys could fly.”

The comment came after he and ace newsman Les Nessman (Richard Sanders) carried out a television promotion by dropping turkeys onto a St. Louis shopping center. Nessman was doing a live radio broadcast and described the turkey “bombing” in a parody of the Hindenberg disaster.

“Oh, the humanity!”

I laughed so hard I saw spots before my eyes. I missed the next several lines and look forward to more reruns to see what I missed.

The 90 episodes of “WKRP” ran on CBS from Sept. 18, 1978, to Sept. 20, 1982, and were so impressive that many people, on their first visits to Cincinnati, ask to see the WKRP station, convinced that it was real.

Jump, who actually started his career in a Dayton, Ohio, radio station, was a familiar television face, since he went on to star in commercials as “the loneliest guy in town,” the Maytag repairman. His family noted in his obituary that he really was a skilled dramatic actor. But we will always remember him as Big Guy.

Jump was the cement that held a sensational cast together. He was the bumbling boss of the station, even though his mother, Lillian “Mama” Carlson (Carol Bruce), really ruled the roost. It was his bumbling that allowed the gloriously, sensationally attractive bombshell Jennifer (Loni Anderson) to show her wares, as if she needed to do anything besides sit there.

The characters were fabulous. Nessman was the farm report-obsessed newsman on a station too poor to give him walls for a private office. So he put tape on the floor and imagined his own walls. Those who wanted to enter his “office” had to knock on his imaginary door.

Then there were the garish suit jackets worn by WKRP ad salesman Herb Tarlek (Frank Bonner). He once said he had to go to a pro shop in Tennessee to get his outrageous outfits. Tarlek persisted in chasing Jennifer, a situation good for at least 10 shows a year.

The big hit of the show was lunatic Johnny Fever (Howard Hesseman), the rabid disc jockey star of the station who had sampled a little too much of the psychedelic offerings of the 1960s. Then there was the goody-two-shoes Andy Travis (Gary Sandy), who was a hired gun imported to try to inject the profit motive into station operations.

I must admit that I always had a crush on Bailey Quarters (Jan Smithers), at least when Jennifer was not on camera. The quiet, bespectacled Bailey was someone you could ask out for a drink and have a shot at success. You knew in your 1970s heart of hearts that Jennifer would not even answer.

The show is still so popular that it has several Web sites. On one site, “Gislef” of Iowa City proposes that “WKRP” was the funniest television show of all time. His argument: “Only a very few comedies have reached what I consider the height of mixing pathos, characterization, slapstick, verbal byplay: ‘Night Court,’ ‘Cheers,’ ‘Mary Tyler Moore.’ But ‘WKRP’ manages to surpass them all. ‘WKRP’ comes out ahead of most of these (except maybe ‘Night Court’) because it was a true ensemble. It didn’t focus on just Sam & Diane, or just Mary, but equally covered each of its cast members, giving them almost-equal screen time.”

I shall not argue with Gislef, out of respect for the dead.

If, in fact, “WKRP” was the funniest TV show of all time, then Jump had the funniest individual line of all time.

“As God as my witness, I thought turkeys could fly.”

Rest in peace, Big Guy.

Send complaints and compliments to Emmet Meara at emmetmeara@msn.com.